ACLU: Chicagoans among most-watched citizens in U.S.

New report calls on city to halt expansion of surveillance system

February 08, 2011|By Erin Meyer, Tribune reporter

Sam Joudeh says he welcomed a police camera outside his Jamaica Food & Liquor in Bronzeville. “It’s saving lives,” he says. A new report by the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois calls on the city of Chicago to halt expansion of the surveillance system. (Zbigniew Bzdak, Chicago Tribune)

With more than 1,200 police surveillance cameras, combined with thousands more at public and private buildings and facilities, Chicagoans are among the most-watched citizens in the country, according to the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois.

In a 44-page report to be made public Tuesday, the ACLU called on the city to halt expansion of the surveillance system until safeguards are put in place to protect the "fundamental American right to be left alone."

"The (ACLU of Illinois) believes that Chicago does not need a camera on every sidewalk, in every block, in every neighborhood," the ACLU wrote. "Rather, our city needs to change course, before we awake to find that we cannot walk into a bookstore or a doctor's office free from the government's watchful eye."

The Police Department has deployed 1,260 surveillance cameras across Chicago, but it has access to thousands more, the ACLU said.

Chicago Public Schools has more than 4,500 cameras in and around schools, the Chicago Transit Authority has 1,800 cameras on buses and in train stations, and O'Hare International Airport has at least 1,000, according to the report. Add to that cameras at McCormick Place, Navy Pier and private video surveillance systems at the Willis Tower, the John Hancock building and elsewhere, and city officials have access to an integrated system of some 10,000 cameras, according to the ACLU.

And the newer cameras have advanced capabilities, the ACLU said. When Chicago's Office of Emergency Management and Communications receives a 911 call, camera operators in its control room can zoom in on an object or individual. They can also employ camera technology to recognize and track a vehicle or the image of an individual's face as they move about the city.

The ACLU recommended that camera operators be required to show reasonable suspicion before being allowed to zoom in on an individual and a higher standard of proof — probable cause — before using the "facial recognition" technology. It also favors a policy to prohibit operators from training lenses inside a residence and business, as well as a policy to bar operators from considering traits including race, gender, religion and sexual orientation when singling an individual out.

City officials have stood behind the new technology and its value in fighting crime.

According to Chicago police, the surveillance cameras have played a role in the arrest of 4,500 individuals since 2006.

"Public safety is a responsibility of paramount importance, and we are fully committed to protecting the public from crime and upholding the constitutional rights of all," said Lt. Maureen Biggane, a police spokeswoman who noted that the department had not seen the ACLU report.

The Office of Emergency Management and Communications did not respond to requests for comment.

The ACLU declined to say whether it plans to try to force the city's hand with a lawsuit over the cameras.

"Our focus right now is to persuade policymakers at the city level to implement a moratorium on new cameras, to do a study and to put in place these regulations," said Adam Schwartz, co-legal counsel for the ACLU, who is hopeful that Mayor Richard Daley's successor will look at the widespread use of the cameras.

In some neighborhoods that are "hot spots" for crime, residents and business owners said privacy is not their top priority.

"We asked for the camera," said Sam Joudeh, who five years ago helped lobby the local alderman for a police camera to combat crime at Cottage Grove Avenue and 43rd Street. "They bought it for us, and I'm glad."

It is one of 37 cameras known as police observation devices in the Prairie Police District alone.

Joudeh, the owner of Jamaica Food & Liquor for almost 30 years, said the camera makes his customers and employees feel safer.

"It's saving lives," he said.

But Lamont Williams, 34, who works as a stylist at Soul Salon at the same South Side corner, said he doesn't believe crime has declined because of the cameras.